Tsk, tsk, tsk...typical lazy Negro
SUPERVISOR: I have an internship available.
SUPERVISOR: It’s 1,500mi away.
SUPERVISOR: And it’s for nine weeks.
SUPERVISOR: You’ll have to find and pay for your own housing.
SUPERVISOR: And pay for your own way there.
SUPERVISOR: And the internship is unpaid.
JAMAL: Sorry, my family only makes $43,000/yr. That’s going to be pretty challenging for me to do. You know, with the consequences of slavery and Jim Crow, African-Americans lag behind whites in terms of income, wealth, social mobility, and education.
CODY: Well my family makes $71,300/yr. Though we came from Europe during the early 1900s, we benefited from the legislation geared towards prohibiting blacks from gaining jobs and education opportunities that were exclusively open to us.
SUPERVISOR: Well I’ll give you the internship, Cody. Since you have the means and resources to take it. And Jamal…that sounds like an excuse. You’re just lazy.
CODY: I got to where I am today by hard work and determination. I have no advantages over anybody. If they didn’t make it, it’s only because they didn’t work as hard as I did.
———–
Now this conversation wouldn’t actually take place like this, but it might as well. See…people who have unfair/unearned advantages don’t like to admit it because it makes them feel as though they don’t really deserve what they have.
To compensate for this, they say others didn’t work as hard. That makes themselves feel better.
Now I’m not saying white folks don’t work hard. I’m just saying they don’t have to. Not as hard as blacks and other minorities have to, anyway. Because being white is a qualification. If you’re white, things that make you qualified for something are automatically attached to you.
If you’re white, it’s assumed you have the education and competency and skills. If you’re not white, then you have to prove that you have the education, competency, and skills–and typically, you have to prove it to somebody who already believes you don’t. You have to make that person admit he/she is wrong about you…and how many people do you know readily admit they’re wrong?
The privileged hate admitting they’re privileged. They have it in their minds that they deserve the good education and the easily accessible information for social mobility, and those who attend failing schools and have a harder time accessing information about jobs and internships and other opportunities…well they deserve to have that life. So I don’t feel bad for them. They want it.
How do I know they want it?
Because they’re always on TV and in movies living like that and being like that, so they must want their lives to be that way.
Never mind it’s the privileged people creating and disseminating these stories.
Never mind that when LaToya Taylor from the Bronx who went to an HBCU wants to be one of the writers for a television series about blacks in the Bronx, she’s told she doesn’t have the qualifications that Maynard P. Ogletree III who went to Stanford University and is from Orange County does, so he’s given the job and she’s not.
Never mind that when Rashad Greene pitches a story about a black architect and her software engineering husband to the network, he’s told “We already have two black shows on. Wait until one goes off the air, and then we’ll think about yours.”
No. Forget all that. Everybody knows that what you see in the media is accurate, so if I mainly see blacks being a certain way, then it must mean A. That’s how most are, and B., That’s how they want to be.
You see, there’s a pipeline for privileged people, who are overwhelmingly white. They get the best of the best, and they’re told their whole lives “You deserve it.”
And it’s not because they’re smarter.
It’s not because they have more talent.
It’s not because they worked harder.
It’s because they’re white.
That’s just it. But that stings, so they tell themselves other reasons as to why they deserve these things. They even go as far as to say “White privilege is myth.” LOL!
It’s really all about who can easily access information and opportunities. If you know about something, that’s an advantage right there–whether you can access it not. Just knowing about it puts you at an advantage because you can figure out how to get it, or how to get similar opportunities, or you can tell your friends about it and they can get it. Then they turn around and help you.
Knowledge, essentially, is a privilege. And access to knowledge is also one. Some of the best information is intentionally kept away from blacks and other minorities because those at the top are scared what’ll happen if those at the bottom are privy to it.
And to the privileged, that’s frightening because they’ll lose their statuses that they worked hard to gain and deserve…but if they deserved it, they can’t lose it…so deep down they know they don’t deserve it….
blakekathryn
andulkaphoto
pixelskylines
romaincrisis